In my case (error 0xfaf), I deleted the subnet in AD that had the mail server. Therefore, the Exchange was unable to locate the DC/GC in its site. After recreating the subnet, all the services started like a charm.

ME836027 and ME873452 provide hotfixes for Microsoft Exchange Server 2003 on this problem.

As per Microsoft: "Microsoft Exchange Server service was unable to initialize. Often, this is because the Exchange server account might not have the correct permissions". See MSEX2K3DB for additional information.

- Error 0xfffff8ed - Chances are your antivirus program is not configured properly and has quarantined a log file. Stop it from scannig your log directory, then restore it from the quarantine direcotry and restart the services. Ours worked immediately after that. See also ME819553.

The problem occurs when the Information Store stops abnormally and the Eseutil.exe hard repair option (/P) is run against the Priv.edb file to return it to a state in which it can be started. In addition, the previous transaction log files were deleted, as recommended in the Eseutil dialog box, but hard repair was not run against the Pub.edb file.

You Cannot Install a Second Exchange 2000 Server in an Exchange 2000 Server Site and Event ID 9525, 1121 and 5000 Error Messages Are Logged.ME305392 says "This issue may occur if authenticated users do not have read access in the Domain container or in the Configuration container in Active Directory" and provides a fix.